[Fleet Marriages], clandestine marriages, suppressed in 1754, performed without license by the chaplains of Fleet Prison, London.
[Fleet Prison], a celebrated London jail in Farringdon Street; was a debtor's prison as far back as the 12th century.
[Fleetwood, Charles], a Cromwellian officer; fought as lieutenant-general against the king at Worcester, and acted as lord-deputy in Ireland; on the death of Cromwell advised the abdication of Richard; d. 1692.
[Flegel], African explorer, born in Wilna, of German descent; made three journeys from Europe to explore the Niger territory, in which he made important discoveries; was suddenly stricken down in the last (1855-1886).
[Fleischer, Heinrich Leberecht], Orientalist, born at Schandau, Saxony; after a university training at Leipzig he undertook a catalogue of the Oriental MSS. in the royal library at Dresden, and in 1836 became professor of Oriental Languages at Leipzig; did important work as a critical editor of Oriental works and MSS. (1801-1888).
[Fleming, Paul], a celebrated German poet, born at Hartenstein, Vogtland; received a medical training at Leipzig, and was engaged in embassies in Russia and Persia; settled in Hamburg in 1639, but died the following year; as a lyrist he stood in the front rank of German poets (1609-1640).
[Flemish School], a school of painting established in the 15th century, and to which Reubens, Vandyck, and Teniers belonged.
[Fleshly School], a name given by Robert Buchanan to a realistic school of poets, to which Rossetti, William Morris, and Swinburne belong.
[Flesselles], the last provost of the merchants of the Hôtel de Ville, Paris; "shot by an unknown hand at the turn of a street" after the fall of the Bastille (1721-1789).
[Fletcher, Andrew], of Saltoun, a Scottish patriot and politician; after travelling on the Continent for four years he entered the Scottish Parliament, but got into trouble through his opposition to James, Duke of York, the Royal Commissioner in Scotland, and fled to Holland; his estates were confiscated, and for the next seven years he was a political refugee; he took part in the Rye House Plot and in Monmouth's invasion; his estates were restored in 1688, and he again sat in the Scottish Parliament; he was an active promoter of the abortive Darien Scheme, and a strong opponent of the Union of 1707 (1653-1716).